|
師父上人，各位善知識：我是果遜，今天練習報告。
今天我們有很多越南的道友來參訪，漢堡大學的學生，在這個周末也要來。今年我們終於得到許可，能夠進展在萬佛城東邊加建新的建築，包括大殿。這就好像大放光明一樣，能夠吸引遠近很多眾生……。
經云：佛法從難中起。我們都知道初祖達摩祖師在中國是多麼的困難，很多壞人要把他毒死，六祖也必須要躲起來，以免被人所害。我之所以提這些，只是想提醒大家，萬一我們建大殿的時候遇到一些困難，我們已經歷了各種困難，才走到目前的階段，我們並不只是在蓋房子而已，實際是在末法時代推展正法的大業。
現在我跟大家講一個關於菩薩幫助人找到地下寶藏的故事。總聽人說﹕「這一定是上人要你這樣做的。」我想很多人曾經有過這種經驗，往往以為自己是照著師父上人的指示在做。結果，上人卻不准那麼做。以下是我親身經歷的故事。
當聖城剛買下來幾年後，整個電力系統都中斷了，所以我們就到處檢查，後來發現在地底下的電纜有些壞了，我們寫了一份申請書給上人，要買一些地下電纜。雖然很貴，上人批准了，我們買回來後，把那個壞的地方換裝新電纜，聖城就又有電了。幾年以後，電又斷了，我們到處檢查，發現又是地下電纜壞了，所以又寫了一份報告，採購地下電纜，汰舊換新後，又恢復供電。所以在頭十年之內，如果整個供電系統壞了，我們就跟師父申請，買新電纜回來，把壞的部份換了，這樣就沒有問題了。
過了十年之後，有一天又停電了，我們發現又有一段地下電纜因為被高壓電燒壞了，計量長度後，又寫了一個報告給師父，請准購買。在那時候我以為上人會讓我們請購新的回來，再把壞的電纜換掉。同仁中有會說中國話的去向上人報告，回來說：「師父說我已經買了足夠的電纜了，我不要再買任何的電纜，你們現在就把電修好，不准再去買任何電纜。」我簡直無法相信我所聽到的。我問那位翻譯的人說：「師父真的這樣講嗎？」我真的傻了，啞口無言，一點把握都沒有，怎麼樣才能把停電給修好。
在這種不知所措的情況下，我就邊看四周，邊想了一下，盤算著在一個供工作人員進入地下的人孔中，好像有印象看到過有一點地下電纜，可是那只有二十呎，目前壞掉的電纜須要三百呎。不管怎樣，我就去把人孔打開，把二十幾呎的電纜拉出來，我用力拔出了二、三十呎之後，因為電纜的另一端固定在地下，再也沒有辦法拉出來了。後來我發現這電纜不止二、三十呎，還有些埋在地底下，只是不知道通到那裡去。我就又開始動腦筋，既然還有一些在裡面，說不定夠我修壞掉的部份。
我們就到處看，順著電纜的方向往地下去找。後來發現在一段補過的柏油路底下，與這條纜線剛好相通，但是看不出它往那裡去，轉來轉去，看起來好像電纜就是通過戒壇向北邊去。後來在我們繼續找的時候，發現這種電纜還不是普通的電纜，而是一種很高級的高壓電纜，而且是地下用的，是當年州立醫院放進去的。後來我們又發現另外一個人孔裡有電纜，也是走到地下的管道裡面，這個人孔是在一個電力輸送站旁邊。後來我們又發現州立醫院在未關閉前，計劃在戒壇加裝一個新的電力供應站，結果施工還沒有完成，醫院就關閉了。
所以我們新發現的電纜從電力轉供站，一直通過戒壇那邊，但是這樣電纜還是不夠，我們還需要一條從戒壇到附近電力轉供站的電纜。後來我們繼續找，又發現在電力轉供站裡面還有一條電纜是通往附近的電線桿，而這條電纜剛好是我們所需要的長度。在那個時候，我們有四、五個人大家都會做高壓電纜的工作，萬佛城過去從來沒有這麼多人懂這個技術，所以這是一個很好的機會，能夠把新的高壓電纜接到我們高壓電的系統裡面。這個地下電纜斷掉的部份是在醫院大樓周圍的西北邊，接近溼地的地方。
那邊在冬天，地下的水位很高，水從人孔裡不斷的冒出來，所以那一帶很濕。因為那裡地下水太多了，我們就決定，地下高壓電纜不要走那個地方，所以我們放棄壞掉的那一整條線，另外再做一條。花了一個月的時間，新電纜線安裝完畢，電力恢復了。
結果我們只買了些電纜的接頭，並沒有買新的電纜。我們所找到品質極佳的電纜，非常之昂貴，我們真可說是在地下發現了寶藏！所以每次有人說：「喔！我這樣做是上人的意思，是他要我這樣做。」由我自己的經驗，我總覺得上人的境界真的是不可思議。一般人哪裡會知道上人要他們做什麼事？阿彌陀佛！
|
|
Today we had a large group of Vietnamese people come, students from Humboldt State, and as it was a weekend day, various visitors from near and far.
This year we’re able to go forward towards our goal, building a large complex including a Buddhahall on the east portion of the City of 10,000 Buddhas. This will be a bright light that will attract many more living beings, and a much more diverse group of living beings than ever before.
It is said that the Buddhadharma arises from difficulty. Look at how difficult it was for the first Patriarchs in China. Rivals tried to poison and kill the Fir st Patriarch Bodhidharma, and forced the Sixth Patriarch into hiding. I mention this just in case we run into difficulties and trouble as we try to build our new Buddhahall. We’ve already experienced a great deal of difficulties just to get to this point. We’re not just putting up a building but trying to propagate the Proper Dharma in the Dharma Ending Age.
Now I will tell you a story of how a Bodhisattva enables living beings to uncover treasures buried in the earth. At various times people have said, “Well, you must be doing what the Venerable Master wants you to do.” I think many disciples thought at one time or another that they were doing what the Venerable Master wanted, only to find out the Venerable Master did not approve.
Here’s my story: When we first bought the City of 10,000 Buddhas, after a few years, the power failed. Well, we looked around and found out that there was some wire in the ground that had gone bad and we put in a request to the abbot so we could buy some wire. The Venerable Master approved the request for the wire even though it was very expensive. We got the wire and put it in the ground. We connected everything back together again so we could start our electricity. A few years later the power went out again. We looked around, found where the wire had gone bad, put in a request and fixed the problem again. So it went for the first ten years at the City of 10,000 Buddhas. When the power went out, we requested wire, put it in and fixed the problem.
One day, ten years after the City of 10,000 Buddhas was established, the power went out again. We looked around and found out there was a section of wire that had blown apart from the high voltage. We figured out how much wire we needed and submitted a request to the Venerable Master. Well, at that time I thought that was what the Venerable Master wanted us to do--put in a request for wire and go ahead and put the new wire in. Someone who spoke Chinese went in and talked to the abbot and then came back and told me what he’d said. The abbot said, “I’ve bought enough wire. I’m not buying anymore wire. You fix this without buying any wire.” I could hardly believe what I heard. I asked the translator, “Is that what he really said?!” I was stunned. I didn’t know if we would ever get our electricity back. In this stunned state, I looked around, thought about our situation and said, “Well, there’s a little bit of wire that I’ve seen coiled up in a manhole in the ground.”
That was only 20 or 30 feet of wire. We needed 300 feet of wire. I went and opened up the manhole and pulled out the wire anyway. I pulled out 20 or 30 feet; that’s as far as I got. The other end was stuck in the ground. That wasn’t the end of the wire; there was more buried in the ground there. I tried to figure out where the rest of the wire was. Since some of it was buried in the ground, maybe there was a little bit more wire we could use and take over to where we wanted to do the repair.
We looked around and we found a section of road where the asphalt had been cut up and then repaired, directly in line with where this wire was. But we couldn’t figure out where it went from there. There was just this one zigzag portion. This was across from the Precept Hall to the north of the Precept Hall. It went toward the Precept Hall and that’s as far as we could figure out where it went. We kept looking around. This was an unusual wire. As it turned out, this was a special high quality, high voltage wire that the state hospital had put in. We found another manhole that had the wire going into the ground. This manhole was down by the substation where the power came in. We found out later that before the state hospital closed, they had planned to put in a new switching station across from ‘I’ building. The state hospital had closed down before they had a chance to finish these plans.
As it turned out, this wire went all the way from the substation to across from ‘I’ building. We still didn’t have enough wire. We needed some wire to go from the manhole by ‘I’ building to the nearest manhole in our high voltage system.
However, we looked around by the substation and found a length of wire down by the substation. It was meant to go from the substation to a nearby pole. As it turned out, this wire was just long enough. It turned out that just at that time, we had a crew of four or five people, all of whom could work on the high voltage system, many more people than we had before. This was a good time for us to connect this high voltage wire to our power system. The place where the power had gone out was the road that goes around the hospital to the north and west, close to the wetland.
In the winter, water pours out of the manhole in a fountain; it gushes up from the hole in the manhole. That’s how wet that area is. This was not a good place to run high voltage wire. We abandoned that section because we had the new wire, and we never used it again. It took about a month but we restored the power.
We bought splices and other supplies but we didn’t buy any wire. That wire that we used was in excellent condition. It would have been extremely expensive to buy that wire. It was truly a great treasure that we found in the ground. And so, when people say, “Well, I think this is what the abbot wanted us to do,” I think of this story. His state was inconceivable. I don’t think anybody really knew what the abbot wanted them to do. Amitabha!
|
